These guys really hate the Orange Juice blog!
What a week it has been here at the Orange Juice blog. On the one hand we were rated #1 again this week in the Blognetnews.com Political Blog rankings – and my New Santa Ana blog was rated #5, which was a nice bonus. On the other hand, I have never received more legal threats than I did this week.
All told, we received threats this week from an angry guy named Dan Avery, Santa Ana wannabe council candidate Stanley Fiala and just about the entire crew at the Liberal OC blog.
The week began with threats from Avery, who has been attacking us and our blogger Larry Gilbert for months. Avery opposes the recall of Republican Lance MacLean, who is a Council Member in the City of Mission Viejo. Gilbert is of course a supporter of the recall effort. I have never quite understood why a liberal like Avery purports to be would care about MacLean, but apparently he does.
A ruckus developed at a recent Mission Viejo City Council meeting when an ally of MacLean accused a friend of Gilbert of saying nasty things to her at the meeting. Gilbert spoke to a half dozen witnesses – and none of them heard the comments. But Avery swore he did although he was seated quite far from the fracas. So Gilbert called him a liar. Then Avery started emailing me and threatening to sue me if I didn’t kick Gilbert off this blog.
So we blocked Avery from being able to read this blog and from being able to comment here.
But the week wasn’t over. Next we heard from the blue boys over at the Liberal OC blog. I actually reached out to them this week, in a nice email, offering to bury the hatchet and move on. Their response was a nasty letter from a lawyer named Todd Gallinger. Does that name sound familiar? It should. He is the guy who ran last year for the Irvine City Council, only to get blown out when voters found out he was a lawyer for CAIR, an organization that, just after the 9/11 attack on our country, was asking for money for Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF). HLS is a HAMAS-front group. HAMAS is the Palestinian terror group that now runs the Gaza Strip.
Gallinger, by the way, lost to my friend Steven Choi. No wonder Gallinger is now attacking me – I am supporting Choi’s Assembly campaign. Should lawyers threaten folks with lawsuits when they have political conflicts of interest? I wonder what the California State Bar would make of that?
Why are the blue boys at the Liberal OC mad at me? Who knows? They purport to challenge the right wing OC machine, but they are also pals with Matt “Jerbal” Cunningham, the editor of the very Republican Red County blog. Heck, I attack Republicans, well at least the bad ones, more than the Liberal OC guys do!
But this whole mess actually began last year, when Ryan Trabuco, a guy who was supposed to be my friend, sold a URL that he had acquired for me, www.artpedroza.com, to Dan Chmielewski, the editor at the Liberal OC. Dan proceeded to forward the link to his blog.
But that wasn’t all that Trabuco did. He also bought the URL www.seanmill.com, in November of last year.
Trabuco is also the hatchetman for Supervisor Janet Nguyen. When Dina Nguyen, who Janet despises, ran for Orange County Supervisor against Janet, Dina sent out a mailer that referenced her website. But Dina’s printer misspelled the website and it came out as www.dinaforsuppervisor.com. At the time, Nguyen’s husband, Tom Bonikowski, told me he was going to have Trabuco buy the misspelled site. They did and it was then forwarded to an Asian gay porno site. You can read what the Liberal OC wrote about this at this link.
Why am I mentioning this? Because Gallinger mentioned Trabuco in his letter, which you can read by clicking here. Apparently Trabuco has joined Dan and the other blue boys in coming after me. But read the charges in the letter. They are angry because I bought a bunch of URLs with their names and forwarded them to sites of my choosing.
Think about this for a moment. The blue boys started this mess by buying my URL and by buying www.seanmill.com. Their web guy, Trabuco, had a history of buying URLs of political opponents and forwarding them to porno sites. Now the blue boys are mad because I responded in kind.
So let’s put this another way. Dan and Ryan want to be able to harass political opponents by buying their URLs, and forwarding them to sites of their choosing, but they go get a lawyer when that is done to them! Unbelievable.
I told Gallinger in my reply that I would be happy to trade the URLs in question for mine and Sean’s. And of course I have not heard back from him. Perhaps one of our readers can help us if this mess ends up in court. I find it hard to believe that any judge would feel bad for Dan and company when they started this mess and now are crying when their own medicine was fed back to them.
But wait, I had one more threat this week, this time from our resident nutty Czech, Stanley Fiala. He got mad because Mill wondered in a comment how anyone could ride around with Fiala in a car for more than five minutes without wanting to strangle him. Of course Mill was joking. But Fiala now thinks Mill wants to kill him. So of course Fiala is also threatening us.
Sigh. What a week. Everybody hates the Orange Juice blog!
Matt Cunningham outed sex-abuse victims.
I notice that Gallinger’s firm does pro bono work and there has been some recent changes making it more profitable for pro bono firms to do that kind of work:
http://www.gallingerlaw.com/
Gallinger even writes about the issue of conflict of interest: http://www.gallingerlaw.com/new-state-bar-rule-makes-it-easier-for-attorneys-to-represent-pro-bono-clients/12/
You should contact your friends Choi and Shea and see if they have attorney contacts that would do pro bono work for you as well as go after Gallinger and his bully tactics. Contacting the state bar also makes sense. Gallinger can’t just get out his legal letter head to intimidate others when there is a lack of legitimate business being done by his firm during a recession. That is one sad group of “indigents” that Gallinger represents.
Gallinger’s letter claims that Liberal OC is a registered trademark and uses this as a bases for alleging violations of 15 USCA 1125(d) (“ACPA”). However, a search of the USPTO trademark database finds no such registered trademark.
http://www.uspto.gov/
Further, marks protected under this section are those protected under the Lanham Act, into which ACPA was incorporated. Thus, ACPA only protects “famous marks” – “a mark is famous if it is widely recognized by the general consuming public of the United States as a designation of the source of the goods or services of the mark’s owner.” 15 U.S.C. § 1125(c)(2)(A). This standard is “rigorous” and “extends protection only to highly distinctive marks that are well-known throughout the country.” Green v. Fornario, 486 F.3d 100, 105 (3d Cir.2007); See, Philbrick v. eNom, Inc., 593 F.Supp.2d 352
(D.N.H.,2009) (mark for in use for twenty-five years for sales to customers in all 50 states was insufficient to establish mark as a famous mark).
The information provided in this comment is offered purely for informational purposes. It is not intended to create or promote an attorney-client relationship, and does not constitute and should not be relied upon as legal advice. It is not intended to seek professional employment in any state where lawyers in the firm are not admitted to practice, or in any state where this web site would not comply with applicable requirements concerning advertisements and solicitations.
REllie: If an attorney misrepresents the “facts” right from the start, doesn’t that show a problem that should be referred to the state bar?
It seems like this guy Gallinger is in a rush to intimidate a local blogger who has been critical of Gallinger’s own political associates.
NONE of those website urls mean much of anything. They vitually are all “unknowns” who have ramped up their mean little game of buying up each others name urls in order to bug one another. But even in Pedroza’s case where he is claiming to have a popular website, OJ blog is pretty obscure. Only less so then the non-readable crap at the other site.
Art,
it is hard to believe that Gallinger would be so dumb as to know the facts about who all started this silly url-war and now wants to make a case out of it.
Do you think he’s that stupid or you think that the merry band of gallegos, williams/trabuco and LibOc perhaps left that little tidbit out when applying for his services?
And ethically, IF Gallinger is taking this case “pro bono”, would it smack of self-interest for him to do so… he has merely found a cover group to do political attacks against a blogger who has been critical of his own political allies and causes?
I’mmmmmm Baaaaccccckkkkkkk
Hi Dan. Is it true that you are now using legal threats to try and get your way? tisk….
Art, this is hilarious. Reminds me of that threatening letter I got from Jones Day over the Dave Lopez/Probolsky girlfriend post. All the blog ‘pugs cheered!
But when it came down to it they had nothing but gaseous fumes – not even the substance of a Blue Klowty turd.
Ryan Gene have clown shoes that match his clown hat? The guys over at Lib OC are really beginning to annoy me. Let’s face it. My take is they are motivated by ENVY. What a bunch of pests.
“Art, this is hilarious. Reminds me of that threatening letter I got from Jones Day over the Dave Lopez/Probolsky girlfriend post. All the blog ‘pugs cheered!
But when it came down to it they had nothing but gaseous fumes – not even the substance of a Blue Klowty turd.”
But I noticed Tony that you all never wrote anything else about Proballsky’s chick. (even avoiding using her name in this post) Seems like the lawyer’s nastygram had the intended impact.
#10, there was no need to mention her. I can’t even remember her name off the top of my head. Debbie? Dorothy? Destiny?
Our post was about the Dave Lopez story itself and where it occurred – at an Ackerwoman fundraiser. The female in question was incidental. The confrontation between Ackerman and Lopez was priceless and FFFF made the most of it.
The Jones Day letter demanded we take take down the post and publish a phony “retraction.” I did neither.
And it turns out it was just a hollow bluff anyhow, although very expensive for who ever had to pay for it – probably Ackerman, Inc.
Tony,
Those Ackermans are just shameful. What are they doing now? I think the Missus failed at getting elected, right? And her hubby was busy doing some kind of lobby work? Can u do a tiny recap of what those two are up to, if you know?
I’d rather think of them a just a rank odor that is dissapating.
The missus re-registerd in Irvine awhile back ath their house inside the top-secret hgated community(what a surprise!).
Dick got busted lobbying for that “Fair Foundation” scam. The DA is suppposed to be looking into County claims of misfeasance – for what that’s worth.
😉
Tony!
This is pretty friggin ridiculous. Do we need to even mention how deep in the jannie camp these ass clowns are anymore? I mean come on! They have Ryan Gene Williams (changed my name to Trabucco to sound mexican so I can get elected)as a plaintiff?
This kid is Janets cyber henchman. And Chris Prevatt is obviously being protected from the layoff axe by janet. For chrizzy sakes!!??
And Claudio? Maybe I should start posting his insane text messages and emails and voice mails he was leaving on my phone accusing me of having Dana Rohrabacher deporting his wife. Or maybe we should point out how him, marc sussman and Phil Becerra were attacking me at my place of business to get me fired.
These guys have to be put down like canabal zombies for the good of mankind.
BTW, Red we had some asshat calling himself “junior” show up over on our blog making an idiot of himself. Word is you kicked his ass over here!
Perhaps I am getting to old, but this all seems juvenile, animal- house-like, to me. Not worthy of blog space in my humble opinion.
“Red we had some asshat calling himself “junior” show up over on our blog making an idiot of himself.”
Tony,
You don’t know the half of it. “Asshat” does not even begin to describe this anti-social maniac. This guy has some real anger issues and when he gets behind a keyboard he turns into a deranged lunatic. I am sorry that he is haunting your blog now.
Sean, you are the last guy on the planet who can criticize someone for “anger issues.”
I wanted to say that clearly, The LOC boys like to dish it out but can’t take it.
But, it quickly occourred to me these guys never dish it out! It is disapointing that popular vehicle for the left insists on defending the poor management of prop 8, rare posts a hard hitting article on state politics and praises the failures of the party.
In short, as they say in Hawaii, they are “the dog that can not bite”.
Forget them, stick your coverage of important subjects and leave the boot licking to Jubal, Dan, Chris and Claudio.
That blog sucks……they never have anything .
I absolutely love the fact that they chose the one and only Todd Gallinger on the case. I laughed pretty hard at Jerbal’s post on Red County. How stupid are they? Only a lunatic would rely on Todd “Baby Boy” Gallinger’s services, he couldn’t even fool Irvine’s drone voters enough to vote for him, much less intimidate the best blog in Orange County. And he was on the omnipotent Agran slate too!
“amoral”????
I thought Matt Cunningham was a closeted homosexual. SERIOUSLY.
He fags around the gym. His old lady expouses anti-marriage views, he loves to quote John and Ken (who one half is GAY) and he secretly cohorts with the LOC guys who are notoroiously pro gay.
This guy needs to get up and peek out the closet. It will certainly hurt his wife, but will help the party, when such a forthright guy comes out. For it was hiding behind a fake name, just like his GG BLVD. bookstore (secret) life.
See you at the Gloryhole JUBAL!
If you need to use a lawyer to fight your battles your a pussy!
lawyers have their place, but not to solve disputes!
“junior” is a troll. Good luck with that!
Dan Avery is a whiny bitch. He comments on all of Gilbert’s posts, but they never have anything to do with the topic. He was whinning about having some medical problem and how important a dog park is because his dog gives him more joy than anything.
Dan go play with your dog instead of threating people on someone elses blog. you obviously spend way to much on the internet looking at gay asian porn and slamming Gilbert. I dont agree with Gilbert all the time but at least he tries to stick to the point.
Thats why you got kicked off. Not for your lame comments but for your threats. Grow up. Dan was even offered his own blog on the Juice and turned it down. Then he threatens with a lawyer because he was blocked.
Im glad you made a name for yourself as the Mission Viejo citzen who is famous for whining about being kicked off a blog site. You have no creditbility and everyone thinks that you are now a puss.